cheryl
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Traveling alone as a woman isn’t necessarily more dangerous, but it is more stressful - Quartzy
Last November, during two weeks traveling solo in the Middle East, I had more conversations with male strangers than I have in two years living in New York.
Nothing threatening or even unpleasant happened, but I spent the entire time watching for warning signs. It is, after all, widely acknowledged that traveling alone is dangerous for women: The New York Times published an article last week detailing some of the recent horrors faced by female solo travelers, and there are countless articles with safety advice specifically catered to women. I have never experienced real danger while traveling, and it’s uncertain that women really do face such a heightened risk. There is, though, one real cost to traveling alone as a woman: the constant, exhausting need to evaluate potential dangers.
There’s a dearth of clear statistics on violence against female travelers, the New York Times notes, meaning it’s hard to get a definitive sense of the risks. And highlighting the physical dangers can come across as scaremongering. An article on bemytravelmuse, a website with an entire section devoted to female solo travel, argues that traveling is in fact much safer for women than staying put. Women, after all, are more likely to be raped or killed by someone they know. And statistically, it’s unlikely to be killed while traveling—on average, only 827 Americans die of unnatural causes while abroad per year, reports Time magazine, out of some 68 million who travel. Meanwhile, adds Time, one of the most common cause of deaths while traveling is car accidents—which is a major problem even if you never leave your home country, as it is the eighth leading cause of death globally.
Last November, during two weeks traveling solo in the Middle East, I had more conversations with male strangers than I have in two years living in New York.
Nothing threatening or even unpleasant happened, but I spent the entire time watching for warning signs. It is, after all, widely acknowledged that traveling alone is dangerous for women: The New York Times published an article last week detailing some of the recent horrors faced by female solo travelers, and there are countless articles with safety advice specifically catered to women. I have never experienced real danger while traveling, and it’s uncertain that women really do face such a heightened risk. There is, though, one real cost to traveling alone as a woman: the constant, exhausting need to evaluate potential dangers.
There’s a dearth of clear statistics on violence against female travelers, the New York Times notes, meaning it’s hard to get a definitive sense of the risks. And highlighting the physical dangers can come across as scaremongering. An article on bemytravelmuse, a website with an entire section devoted to female solo travel, argues that traveling is in fact much safer for women than staying put. Women, after all, are more likely to be raped or killed by someone they know. And statistically, it’s unlikely to be killed while traveling—on average, only 827 Americans die of unnatural causes while abroad per year, reports Time magazine, out of some 68 million who travel. Meanwhile, adds Time, one of the most common cause of deaths while traveling is car accidents—which is a major problem even if you never leave your home country, as it is the eighth leading cause of death globally.